Remember the turtle - - He never makes any progress ‘til he sticks his neck out. ~Source Unknown
My dear friends, we used to live in a two-bedroom apartment prior to buying this house and imagine five people living in it, feeling cramped with movements stifled, lest people living downstairs will come knocking at the door. So the next day after escrow, as you can see, my two munchkins were frolicking as a result of having more freedom and more space as they explored the fourth bedroom. We designated the fourth bedroom as our home office and planned to give it a fresh coat of paint ASAP.
The original color is white, which I call "dirty white" due to the varied kinds of dirt on the walls - hand prints, crayon markings, stickers, tapes, pencil drawings, etc. Note also how unappealing and how dirty that carpet on the floor looks. You are lucky my friends due to the fact that photos can't capture the pungent smell of the fluid that came out of a dog's bladder. Eeewww!
So away we (ahem, read: Mr. Homemaker) prepped the room for painting. For one whole day, the room was a buzz of activities comprised of the sound of gritting sand on the walls, peeling off of the nasty stickers, then eventually the slushing sound of water and bleach as the walls were washed. Mr. Homemaker was keen on washing the walls with bleach and water to eliminate all the grease and dirt so paint will stick to them. When the walls dried came the arduous task of taping the walls and finally, getting acquainted with our beloved paint.
Here are the different colors we tested
and afterwards, we ended up with Robin's Egg in Glidden then asked a Home Depot employee if we can have the same color customized in Behr. Why? Because Behr is a primer and paint in one. Amazingly, the employee just scanned the color we chose in Glidden, then the paint mixer started churning and after a few minutes, we got our Robin's Egg in Behr. Intuitively we knew that it'll save us time and money, considering a gallon of paint itself costs between $25 to $35, plus primer between $15 to $30. Since we planned to paint three rooms in this color, we found out that it's cheaper to have the paint in a 5-gallon pail (after buying a gallon for $30.98 less $5 rebate). Lucky for us, Behr also had promotion during that week - a $20 rebate for buying a pail of paint.
Oh, that sweet smell of paint! Mr. Homemaker, however, wasn't keen of having us get a whiff of the paint aroma so to neutralize it, we got the cheapest can of ground coffee (definitely not the Starbucks kind), opened it, then let it stay for 24 hours in the room. (Oh, yes, we took out those nasty closet doors. We're still deciding whether to reuse them here or just buy new ones.)
So here's our painted walls! (The blotches you can see on the white wall and trim were the holes that we spackled.) Looking at the newly painted walls instantly transformed my distressed and scattered mood caused by the ghetto-ish white color into a calm and relaxed feeling brought out by the new color. I admit, the process was soooo slow and I wished that the things I pictured in my mind will just magically appear and be brought to life that quickly; however, just like the turtle, as long as we stick our necks out, we'll eventually have this home office sassy and fancy according to our liking.
And here they are finally painted with glossy white and Robin's Egg.
Here's our approximate cost to achieve this look:
Four paint testers at $2.94 each = $11.76
We initially used a gallon of paint costing us $30.98 less $5 rebate = $25.98
A pail of paint is $139 less $20 rebate = $119
Since we used a quarter of the pail, this amounts to $29.75.
Hence, the total is $11.76+25.98+29.75= $67.49
How wonderful what a paint can do to alter the look of a room! So to all my friends who are afraid of paint, just go for it, and you'll never look back. Take it from someone who just experienced a painting job for the first time.
I'm linking with the excellent bloggers below so please click on the images for tons of inspiration :)
Stephanie Lynn for her Under The Table and Dreaming Sunday Showcase Party
Susan over at Between Naps on the Porch for her Metamorphosis Monday
Roeshel over at DIY Showoff for her The DIY Show Off Project Parade
Loulou for her very first A Little Distressed Party over at http://thelifeofloulou.blogspot.com/2010/10/little-boy-blue-and-my-first-linky.html
Linda over at Coastal Charm for her Nifty Thrify Tuesdays
Becca at the Blue Cricket Design for Show and Tell Wednesday
Becky@Beyond The Picket Fence for her Thursday Under $100 Linky Party
Strut Your Stuff at Somewhat Simple
Vanessa at Southern In My Heart for her Inspiration Friday!
